Wearing a Mask
by KleeZeeNex
Summary: Thinking isn't a great skill of mine. Thinking gets me into trouble. Thinking keeps getting me beat up by mutant turtles with identity issues.


_Disclaimer: I do not own TMNT. I don't own the Foot either. (Sniff) Don't worry, I'll get over it._

_A/N: Yet another One Shot from me… aren't you all excited? I was going to wait to post this until after I finished posting The Dark Side, but that story is going kind of slowly right now. (Go check it out!) So here I am again._

_BTW, I don't really think that this gives away anything, so I'll tell you now that this fanfic is in the POV of a Foot ninja, NOT any of the turtles (thought they are in it, of course). I just thought I'd let you know to avoid confusion._

_And lastly, this fanfic was rated to be VERY safe. There is a little gore, and it's concept is a little... in depth, so I thought that maybe younger readers wouldn't really take interest in that. But there is no bad language or anything like that. If anyone thinks that I should change the rating, feel free to let me know._

_Now, on with the story!_

X x X x X x X

Streetlights. They always were a comfort to me as a kid. New York used to be a scary place at night. But now, I didn't care for the added light so much. Now, New York is an even scarier place, light or dark.

And it's because of people like me.

Joining the Foot wasn't something I had ever planned on doing. I don't think any child thinks that he or she is going to grow up to be a criminal. They all want to be firefighters, policemen, doctors, or anything else to make the world a better place. But, as those youths get older, reality kicks in. Some change, and some don't.

I changed.

I wasn't looking for a fight. I wasn't even a very violent person. But I needed a family. And when the time came for the Foot to search for new soldiers, I was young and stupid enough to take the first family substitute I could get. That was almost three years before this night. And here I was again, fighting a fight that the Foot almost never won.

That's right; we were fighting the famous turtles.

I ducked with barely an inch to spare as a blade whizzed over my head. That's what thinking gets me. Thinking has always gotten me into trouble. Like, take the time I _thought_ that I should leave the Foot because I didn't want to be a _criminal_ anymore.

Hardly three months had gone by after I joined the Foot when I had had enough. It was after the first fight we had fought with the turtles. The brothers. I saw how they cared for each other, and I realized that we were trying to kill them. Of course I knew this before the Foot set out that night, but some things just don't hit you until a nunchuck smacks you in the face. I had already lost one family. I wasn't about to tear apart another.

After that fight, I had decided to leave my new family. And I had plenty reasons to back myself up. For one, weren't we fighting the good guys? Just because our master had a grudge against the turtles' master didn't mean we had to go out and kill them, did it? And what were the real perks of being in the Foot clan? You break the law. Your master doesn't appreciate you. And, if you're not careful, you get attacked by little green men in dark street corners.

So I left. I didn't leave New York, but I did move pretty far away from headquarters.

I should have left New York.

I probably should have considered myself lucky. The Foot would have killed anyone else who showed disloyalty, especially someone who knew as much as me about the clan. But I guess I showed a lot of promise in the short time I was with them. After all, it was a miracle I got into the Foot in the first place. But I learned fast. In fact, I figured out the number one rule of the Foot clan fairly quickly: Keep your mouth shut. You don't even have to listen to anyone. Just do. And acquire a burning hatred for all amphibians.

I guess that's where I went wrong. I had a pet turtle when I was a kid and still had my parents. His name was Herby. So, the hatred thing never worked out for me so well.

Don't get me wrong—I did get a beating for trying to leave the Foot. And I never tried to leave again.

_Wham_! I doubled over as the red turtle kicked me in the stomach. Gut, meet my good friend Distraction. We're real close.

I backed up and merged with a group of Foot ninjas behind me, deciding to avoid that particular red-clad turtle for as long as possible.

As you could imagine, the mighty Foot clan was loosing. No, we were not outnumbered. And no, we did not have giant shells weighing us down. But that never stopped us from losing to the turtles before.

Hey, just because I gained back my loyalty to the Foot doesn't mean I still respected it.

I stopped backing up a moment too late, because I felt by back collide with someone. I turned around. Orange. He was the one who amazed me the most. I had tried nunchucks once. The bo staff had been my best friend ever since.

I wish I could have said the same about the purple-clad turtle coming my way.

Both Purple and Orange came at me at the same time, which was stupid in my opinion, because they could each take on six of us with one arm tied behind their backs. I ducked just in the nick of time, using my own bo staff to block their weapons. Nevertheless, Purple got a hit in. _Snap_! Yeah, there went my wrist. I gasped in pain and dropped my bo staff. Orange decided to follow up with a blow to my head. I collapsed, though not unconscious. But it wasn't like I was going to let the turtles know that.

I stayed there on the ground for a moment, waiting for Purple and Orange to move on to other victims. That isn't very easy to do with a broken wrist, let me be the first to tell you. But soon I was sure it was alright to get up again and go pretend that I was having fun while attacking giant turtles that were more skilled than me.

That's when I started to wonder about the task I had been expected to do. Kill the turtles. I knew that ninjas had this code of honor thing. Vengeance was a big part of that. If someone killed a person you cared about, then you killed them back. It was simple and easy to remember. I pretended to follow the ninja ways, because I was supposed to, but a lot of it I didn't understand. To be honest, I never wanted to kill anyone, and I never had. I had always believed that it was wrong, just like many other human beings with morals. I never really knew why I was so against killing, myself, but it was a notion that made me queasy just thinking about it.

_Slice_. Oops. I barely had time to scold myself for losing concentration again before Blue came at me another time. Blood flowed over my broken wrist as I dodged his second swing. If there was one thing that I had learned about the turtles in my years of being in the Foot clan, it was this: stay away from Blue. Sure, Red was scary and the most violent, but Blue was deadly. He was also gentle. I would have tried to figure out how one can be both at the same time, but a glint of silver was plummeting to my head. I ended up ducking out of the way, realizing for the first time that I had left my bo staff behind after being attacked by Purple and Orange.

That was when I heard a shout from behind me. "Mikey!" Apparently Blue heard it too, because he snapped his head up at the voice. To me, it sounded like Red. I chanced a look over my shoulder. Orange was lying on the pavement, a small trail of blood soiling the ground underneath him. I didn't try to figure out where the blood was coming from, because I had just realized my mistake. I whipped back around to Blue, hoping that he was still distracted.

Too late.

From the murder written in Blue's eyes as he looked down at me for that fraction of a second, I knew that Orange was in bad shape. I realized then that these turtles didn't look at us as individuals. We were one clan. And that clan had just hurt his brother.

I was part of that clan.

I guess that he wanted to get through with me quickly so that he could cut down as many of us as possible as he got to Orange, because he wasted no time bringing his sword down on me. It sliced me from my right shoulder to my left hip. I fell. But it wasn't enough to stop my breathing. Not yet. Blue was angry, but he wasn't cruel enough to leave dying person in pain. I didn't have enough time to rip off my mask and scream, "Wait! I didn't want this!" I just had to sit there as Blue ran his sword through my stomach.

Darkness began to cloud my vision quickly. I had to force myself to keep my eyes open through the pain long enough to watch Blue's legs disappear, as he ran to his brother's aid. With a grunt, I leaned over and used my hands to support my weight. My palms landed in my own blood. But still I fought to stay conscious just a little longer.

I took those final seconds to understand something at last. I knew then why killing was wrong, not matter how justified it seemed. I knew why it wasn't our place to judge who deserved to live. It was because there was no sure way for any of us to know—

_Thud_.

—who really deserved to die…

… especially if they were wearing a mask.

X x X x X x X

_A/N: __I would very much enjoy any comments that you may have! See that little purple rectangle in the bottom left-hand corner? Click it! You know you want to. Thanks for reading!_


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